In the operation of a modern bakery, dough is placed in pans adapted for transporting the dough along a conveyor system. A quantity of dough is placed in each pan and is then conveyed to a proof box. The dough rises within the proof box until the desired consistency is provided. When the dough has risen, the pans are transported to an oven for baking.
During the transfer of the risen dough from the proof box to the oven, the dough is unstable and can be ruined if subjected to excessive mechanical shock. In most baking operations, pans containing the risen dough are grouped prior to entering the oven. It is therefore necessary that each pan come into contact either with a barrier or with another pan in order to assemble the group of pans prior to entry into the oven.
It has been found that contact between a pan containing conventional risen dough with another object at a combined velocity in excess of 68 feet per minute will cause the dough to fall. An industry-wide maximum pan conveying speed of 60 feet per minute has therefore been adopted which assures that no pan will be subjected to shock sufficient to cause the dough to fall.
However, recently so-called tender doughs have been employed in baking operations. Experience has taught that tender dough will not survive contact with an object at a combined velocity in excess of about 30 feet per minute. It will be understood that since existing bakeries are designed to operate at the prior standard conveyor velocity of 60 feet per minute, reducing the converging speed between the proof box and the oven to a velocity of 30 feet per minute disrupts the entire baking operation.
Therefore, a need has been shown to develop an apparatus and method for transferring risen dough between a proof box and oven at the industry standard of 60 feet per minute while assuring that no pan containing risen dough will contact another object at a combined speed in excess of 30 feet per minute.